


Napoleon's new car

by DawnlitWaters



Series: Das kleine gelbe auto [1]
Category: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Napoleon Solo Ships Illya Kuryakin/Gaby Teller, Team Bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-03
Updated: 2018-09-03
Packaged: 2019-07-06 14:54:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15888303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DawnlitWaters/pseuds/DawnlitWaters
Summary: In 1963, Napoleon buys a new car.





	Napoleon's new car

**Author's Note:**

> I hadn't realised how much I loved The Man the from UNCLE in general, and these three idiots in particular, until I'd finished this fic.   
> With heartfelt apologies to all Russian, German and American speakers. Any stray bits of wonky vocab are my own doing.

 

It is, predictably, raining when he sets out in the late afternoon.

Raining, but not busy, and he meanders through suburban London with the radio on and not too much on his mind.

The car is going well, as it usually does. He has been taking good care of it, since the ‘little incident’ on the hairpin mountain road between Italy and Switzerland. Illya has still not entirely forgiven him, and always gives him a mournful, guilt-inducing look whenever the topic of car maintenance arises in conversation.

That aside, the car has done well. He’d consulted Gaby first, of course, before he’d bought it. She was pleased with his choice – _“Not one of those stupid Yankee muscle cars”_ – but she’d made him get the GT – _“It comes with the disc brakes – and the way you drive, you will need them.”_

Why she’d made him bother with that he’s not sure: the engine was barely cool in the underground garage when Gaby had arrived, toolbox in hand to _“see what can be done about it.”_

The DB4 has had a few renovations since then, and not solely under Gaby’s hands, although always under her watchful eye.

Napoleon is fairly certain he’s the only man in London with mounts for rocket launchers bolted to the underside of his car.

He likes this car. It’s unexpected: as Peril had said, when Solo had first arrived in it _“It doesn’t match your accent, Cowboy.”_

To which there was really only one answer.

~

Solo slammed the door with aplomb, holding his arms out, inviting them to drink in and appreciate his new purchase.

The little DB4 – _GT_ , as Gaby had advised – shone obediently in the morning sun. Solo felt quite proud of it, protective even. He awaited their vocal approval.

“What is that” Illya asked, arms folded, eyebrow raised.

“An Aston Martin, DB4GT.”

Illya smirked “It doesn’t match your accent, Cowboy.”

“It doesn’t _have_ to match” Solo quipped, as Gaby appeared beside the Russian on the ramp of UNCLE’s little underground car park.

Illya scowled, hunched his shoulders, the tips of his ears pinking, steadfastly _not_ looking at Gaby. Solo filed this away for later:  _three months and counting._

Beside Illya, Gaby took off her sunglasses.

Solo had expected her to be pleased. He had taken her suggestion, behaved himself.

Gaby tutted and muttered something darkly in German. She put her glasses back on, considered, removed them again.

“It’s a DB4” Solo said, irritatingly unpraised “the GT model.”

“Is it supposed to be that colour?” Gaby pointed with the arm of her sunglasses.

“Yes, I had it resprayed.”

Gaby’s eyebrows lifted into her fringe.

“On purpose?”

“ _Yes!”_

“I am not travelling in ridiculous banana toy car” said Illya.

“It’s _gold_ ” Solo insisted.

“Is yellow.”

Illya tilted sideways, arms still folded, to peer in through the rear windows. After a moment, he righted himself.

“Where are rest of seats?”

“They haven’t been fitted yet.”

“It _is_ toy car.”

Gaby tutted again, with a force that nearly took Solo's head off.

“And so where do we sit, Mr Important Suit and Tiny Car?”

“Well you, _Fraulein_ , will sit here, in the passenger seat. Our Russian friend is used to travelling in box cars, tanks and the trunks of cars, and so I’m sure he won’t mind gallantly sitting in the back.”

There was a thick, solid silence.

“ _неt_.”

~

Few people are out and about in the winter drizzle, although it’s not that cold out. He’s warm enough in his coat to barely need the heater.

Too warm for the scarf though: he works it off at the next set of lights, chucks it behind him onto the row of seats in the back of the car, next to his holdall.

It would have been entertaining to see two metres of elite KGB agent folded into the tiny space, like stuffing a full-grown husky onto a parcel shelf. It probably would have required snapping him in two, which is fitting considering this is what Peril had threatened to do to _him_ , should the idea ever be suggested a third time.

Not that the alternative had been all that comfortable.

~

“Что ты делаешь, женщина, ты с ума сошел?!”

Illya had one hand on the strut between the windscreen and the passenger door, the other braced on the ceiling. As usual in moments of great stress and pressure, he had reverted to Russian.

Solo had seen him take down enemy snipers, large numbers of knife-wielding thugs and diffuse an especially complicated chemical weapon, all while maintaining impressive English fluency and diction.

The car rounded another corner, seemingly on two wheels, and Illya’s shoulder was once again thrown against the window. Solo had not yet had the glass strengthened, and he feared for its integrity.

“Это не Восточногерманская уличная гонка, механик девушка!”

Even Solo was struggling with the vocabulary. This must have been why Gaby – still not fluent in Illya’s mother-tongue – was cheerfully ignoring him.

Beaming furiously, she threw the car into another corner, accelerating into the turn and revving up through the gears on what, as far as Solo could make out, looked like a heaven-sent, merciful, _straight._

 “Schneller, schneller, kleines auto!”

Gaby gunned the engine: Solo braced himself on… anything. His hands were wedged against the side of the car, his feet against the other. His back rested on the floor, or apparently, the road. If he’d had the good sense to buy something with five doors, he could at least have ejected himself onto the asphalt by now during one of Gaby’s more ambitious cornering manoeuvres.

The engine was roaring, the car humming all over, everything buzzing with speed.

“медленно, маленький механик, ты убьешь всех нас.”

Solo gritted his teeth, in silent agreement. Of the things he’d planned on doing in the back of his new Aston, meeting his maker hadn’t been high on the list. Although it wasn’t such a bad way to go.

“Schreie wenn du schneller gehen willst!”

The engine complied as Gaby jabbed her foot at the floor. Even Solo, who had endured frequent German tutting and light bodily assault for having no mechanical sympathy, felt the car’s pain.

And then something incredible happened.  

Illya laughed.

Solo hardly credited it at first: assumed he was hearing things. His life flashing before his eyes, a depressingly cliché climax to a not-uninteresting life. But Illya never laughed, _had_ never laughed. Possibly since birth, all things considered, but certainly not since Solo had known him.

It couldn’t be Gaby, not that deep, unmistakably Slavic rumble, and it sure as Hell wasn’t him, praying for death or redemption, wedged into the unforgiving back-end of the DB4.

 _DB4GT_ , he reminded himself. _The model with the shorter wheelbase. To reduce weight_.

_And optional back seats._

Gaby slammed them into another corner, at an impossible, neck-breaking speed.  Solo couldn’t help feeling that the good work of Aston Martin’s engineers – shaving weight off the GT model – was rather undone by sitting 200lbs of KGB agent in the passenger seat.  He felt, unusually for him, a sense of regret.

But then Illya laughed _again_.

And then Gaby was laughing; both of them, bubbling unselfconscious, death-defying laughter in the front seats of his new car. Like they were having the time of their lives.

And it occurred to him that they were. All three of them.

~

He’d had the seats fitted shortly after, although they were essentially ornamental, without even enough legroom for Gaby. Although they had at least provided some padding for whichever poor agent ended up in what was jokingly referred to as ‘Napoleon’s Affections’ – small, and difficult to get into.

It was normally him, anyway. Folded up like an ill-treated umbrella, while Illya sat in the front seat hunched over the radio, busying with the map or calmly tightening the silencers on the Brownings.

Gaby at the wheel, always, and of course.

He turns off the main road, into the little residential side street. Begins picking his way through the rows of neat Georgian townhouses, their railings shining in the drizzly wet.

The street he’s looking for is unremarkable, much like all the others. Tall, thin townhouses set back from the sidewalk with steps up to their front doors. The little street drowses through its grey Sunday afternoon, as the brash American parks his sunny yellow Aston Martin on the kerb.

He gets out of the car, turns to retrieve his scarf, and then his leather holdall. Shutting the door and moving to the passenger side, he lifts out the second bag with care, balancing it on the holdall between the handles to steady it. Finally, he reaches in for his constant walking companion, then shuts the door, and locks the car.

He has a feeling it will be fine, just here. In front of this very particular house.

He limps up the pavement, bag in one hand, cane in the other. The cane is black, matte: rather fine. Gaby says it makes him look distinguished, with a hint of diabolical mystery.

 _"Injured in vigorous leisure activity"_  the Russian had quipped, raising his eyebrow but without looking up from his book, which was practically pornographic coming from Illya Kuryakin. Gaby had kissed him sweetly on the crown of his head, as if praising him for being lewd in public.

He’d have taken it for pity, coming from anyone else.

As it is, Gaby has been proved right. He does alright, for an ex-spy with a bust leg.

He walks up to the steps of the nearest house, past the wet metal railings with their immaculate black paint. He looks up at the shiny black door, with its shiny brass knocker and the cheery little wreath hanging from it. It is early, but there is golden yellow light coming from the windows, beyond the sheers.

 _“Net curtains”_ Illya had enunciated, carefully, when he had been trying to perfect his English. Specifically British English, for living in Britain. Solo had shrugged – he’d never bothered.

He never intends to, either. His accent and his familiar and yet exotic vocabulary is one of his few, unfading charms, and he intends to work it for all that it’s worth. That and his hair, which is mercifully faithful to his scalp and looks like staying forever, thank God.

He puts down his bag, shifts his arm to check his watch.

Perfect timing, as usual. _03:45, December 23 rd_.

He sucks in a breath, lets it out in a rush of white steam.

_1984._

He knocks on the door. He hears the muffled sound of footsteps, the sound of voices getting closer.

They speak in ‘Ger-sian’ these days – a garbled mixture of two not very similar languages, indecipherable to either Russian or German speakers. Even Napoleon Solo, nowadays master of almost seven languages, including _both_ Russian and German, has to tune his ear back in to keep up.

The last time he’d seen Waverley, the old man had confessed that they’d given up tapping the phone lines, because no one in the agency had a hope in hell of translating what was going on fast enough to do anything about it.

_“We just put a panic cord in the broom cupboard with a line to HQ and hope for the best.”_

_“What if they’re plotting_ against _us?”_ Solo had asked, because it seemed too obvious not to.

_“Then we’re buggered” said Waverley, and finished his drink._

The door opens, revealing Illya, filling most of the doorway.

“Cowboy” says Illya, in greeting.

“Peril.”

Illya smiles. It is less rare, these days.

“Merry Christmas” Solo offers, in return.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Gaby in translation (I hope):
> 
> Faster, faster little car!
> 
> Scream if you want to go faster!
> 
>  
> 
> Illya in translation (ish. If anyone knows the correct Russian for ‘little chop-shop girl’, help a sister out):
> 
> What are you doing, woman, are you crazy?!
> 
> This is not an East German street race, little chop-shop girl!
> 
> Slowly, little mechanic, you will kill us all.
> 
>  
> 
> Things I looked up while writing this:  
> \- Historic Aston Martins, their specification and paint colours – the only yellow DB4 I could find was the ‘Dinky Toy’ version. It had red seats.  
> \- The type of firearms used in TV / film by Robert Vaughn and Henry Cavill. The gun Solo uses at the start of The Man From UNCLE is a Browning Hi-Power (with suppressor).   
> \- A BMI calculation for a 31-year old, 1.96m tall man, followed by a sense check on how much Armie Hammer himself weighs (I was slightly saddened that, after all, the Internet seemed to know this).   
> \- The origin of the phrase ‘Scream if you want to go faster’.  
> \- Numerous bouts with Google translate.
> 
> Government lists I now appear on:  
> \- Numerous.


End file.
